For writer and cultural historian Malvika Singh, a sari’s drape can carry stories: the way cloth is wrapped may reflect a community’s customs, language, symbols and practical needs. She calls such ways of dressing “living dictionaries”—a metaphor for how clothing can communicate histories, not a formal or universal system for decoding identity.
What Singh means by a “living dictionary”
In a 2025 interview with Scroll.in, Singh said: “The way a sari is worn and draped, the manner in which a dhoti or turban is wrapped, are living dictionaries of communities, languages, customs, symbols and signals, that communicate histories.” The metaphor points to knowledge carried in everyday practices: clothing can make local histories visible without spelling them out in words.
That does not mean a drape has one fixed meaning, or that it can reliably identify every wearer. Singh offers particular examples from her experience and interpretation; they are not an exhaustive guide to India’s many ways of wearing a sari.
How draping responds to regional life
Singh contrasts two regional practices to show how a sari can be adapted to place and activity:
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| Example in Singh’s account | How it is worn or understood | Context she associates with it |
|---|---|---|
| Maharashtra | A nine-yard sari is passed between the legs and brought up to the knees. | Singh connects this arrangement with the mobility needed for wading through paddy fields. |
| Coorg | A distinct way of tying the sari. | Singh presents it as a contrast to the Maharashtra example; the interview does not set out a full description of the Coorg drape. |
These examples show the point of her metaphor: a drape can reflect how people move through a landscape and the customs they inherit. They should be read as Singh’s illustrations, not as rules that apply to every sari wearer in either region.
Why the unstitched cloth matters
Singh’s account places the sari’s adaptability in its construction. “Because what defines the sari is that it is an unstitched length of cloth,” she told Scroll. She describes it as something that can be draped in different ways, including a six-metre sari worn over jeans and a T-shirt. That is her view of what makes the garment a sari, rather than a universally settled definition.
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She also connects wearing unstitched garments with sustaining the skills and traditions of weaving. In her recollections, work to revive interest in saris and handloom textiles included the state-sponsored Festivals of India, initiated in the 1980s to present Indian arts, sciences and traditional legacies internationally. Singh discusses this work in connection with figures including Pupul Jayakar, Martand Singh and Rakesh Thakore, and with the Vishvakarma exhibition. These are her recollections in the interview.
Textile motifs as personal readings of memory
For Singh, the stories in a sari are not only in the drape. She reads textile patterns and colors as signs with cultural resonance. Discussing ajrakh, she associates stars, the waxing and waning moon, and constellations with the sky, and indigo and madder with earth and sky. “For me, those are the colours of India,” she says. The first-person qualification matters: this is Singh’s interpretation of the motifs, not a single meaning shared by all makers or wearers.
Do these 3 things before closing this tab:
1Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitches2Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errors3Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minuteHer memoir also approaches textile history through intimate objects. In a first-person excerpt for The Nod Mag, Singh recalls her mother’s handloom and khadi saris and reflects on Parsi gara embroidery. She describes its bird and floral motifs as evidence of influences absorbed across cultures and trade routes—a personal reading that connects the cloth in her family’s life to wider histories of exchange.
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How the memoir connects one life to a wider history
Saris of Memory: A Memoir uses Singh’s collection and lived experience to tell a broader story about Indian textiles and the revival of handloom traditions. In the Scroll interview, she says she has 1,500 saris in her collection; that is her stated personal figure, not a measure of sari traditions or their prevalence. Vogue India’s interview describes the book as tracing textile legacy through personal narratives and reports that it was scheduled to launch at the Jaipur Literature Festival on February 3, 2025. Singh’s line to Scroll, “The past is a necessary element in the story of the moment,” captures how she links memory with history.
For readers who want to follow that personal account, the memoir is identified in the Scroll interview and discussed in Vogue India.
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